What is the best VPN?

Proton VPN claims they do not log, but that isn't true (surprised?). All you need to do is look around with a search for "does Proton VPN log data". And yes, they do.

Partly, they can't help logging at least your real IP address since you would otherwise not be able to login to your account. A user noted in one topic I found that when they used a Tor browser, their account was immediately deleted. So, if Proton VPN isn't logging data, how would they know the user was using Tor? I suppose the IP addresses of the sites they were connecting would give that away, but you still need logs to find and track that information.

VPNs cost money to run. Hardware, electricity, staff to maintain and run them. For the very few who don't log data (they occasionally get audited to confirm no logs), they have to pay for those expenses somehow. Then it's unwanted ads being pushed to your browser. Or selling the email addresses of their users to spammers and marketers. Whatever they do to cover those costs, you're paying for it somehow. And the best part is, they're not telling you that.

Unless they person running the VPN is rich and is generously doing it as a truly free service because, well, they're just so darn nice, then they are making money to pay for everything one way or another. Logging data is the most common way as it's the best and easiest source to sell as marketing data.

As far as security, VPNs are not security software. Period. They don't block you from visiting suspect sites. They don't stop anything from being download to your computer no matter how dangerous it may be. They don't hide your data since everything out of the VPN to whatever site you're visiting and back to the VPN is in the clear.

What if that "free" VPN is located in China or Russia? Do you really want your communications with your bank going through them?

Did you read this link?

Free VPNs sell your data (just one of many sites explaining this)

And that's from 2022. There is gobs of information out there on this issue.

Or how about this one? VPN reviews you find online are also almost completely untrustworthy:

Former Malware Distributor Kape Technologies Now Owns ExpressVPN, CyberGhost, Private Internet Access, Zenmate, and a Collection of VPN “Review” Websites

The closest you can come to calling VPNs security software is they may - briefly - hide your true location. That can be important to a journalist in a violent regime who put people trying to report the truth away, never to be seen again.

General VPNs are also somewhat quickly becoming obsolete. Service providers are very much pushing all users to make their sites secure (httpS). Like here, as noted by the lock icon in Safari by the URL. Since the communication between yourself and the site is already encrypted, what is the VPN adding? The answer is nothing. You don't need it.

I-Am-Smart wrote:

I would say NORD. Reliable and fast

Any of the available coffee shop VPN apps are excellent choices for extra and poorly-secured and unnecessary network connection overhead, and particularly for allowing advertisers and marketeers to collect personally-identified metadata.

While VPNs that decrypted and then re-encrypted traffic have become less common, the metadata available from outside a TLS connection is still a wonderful source of traffic analysis information, quite possibly including the ability to infer access to sensitive data, and it’s all been thoughtfully matched to the identify of the VPN user account, too.

A variety of the no-logging VPNs were caught logging a few years ago too, when the “non-existent” logs were found on some unprotected and network-accessible hosted storage.

One option for those that really do need this, but need it with potentially better control over access and logging involves either using your own ISP IP box as the VPN server, or using your own hosted VPN server via Algo or other available VPN server package. And iCloud+ Private Relay does well for keeping various sorts of network connections more private, too;

Recommend? No. The single use for a VPN is for "tunneling" into a work /school network. VPN's have lately been marketed as a security measure similar to the same AntiVirus software packages, which is simply not the case. With all your data being sent to the VPN provider, many have been caught selling your data to advertisers and other have been breached exposing users data. Most articles that offer reviews are usually nothing more than paid advertisements where they were paid for the review and some even label the article as "Sponsored". To learn more about VPN's and the risks so you can make an informed decision, review these 2 articles:

• https://gist.github.com/joepie91/5a9909939e6ce7d09e29
• https://overengineer.dev/blog/2019/04/08/very-precarious-narrative/

TonyTheGeek wrote:

, providers like Proton and PIA are far less concerning to me. PIA is "Log Free" so there's nothing to sell or turn over or get exposed in a hack.

You would be mistaken. Just a couple weeks ago a flaw in Proton VPN has put their users data including credit card details at risk. They all say they are "Log Free", that is you trusting what they are saying and is clearly not the case for the breaches that have already occurred.

https://gbhackers.com/500-million-proton-vpn-pass-users/

Do as you wish. You were asking for a recommendations of a VPN and the answer is that there is not one. It is not just my opinion as I also include information for you to review yourself. There really is nothing to argue about. The choice is yours to make.

I would say NORD. Reliable and fast

TonyTheGeek wrote:

It won't let me upvote you. Fast is good, I'll research more. Thank you for your response

I can help you with that research. Not only has NordVPN been breached, but they also got caught lying about what had been stolen and waited a year and a half before letting anyone know. Yep, that is the one.

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/10/hackers-steal-secret-crypto-keys-for-nordvpn-heres-what-we-know-so-far/

Prove it. And yes, I've read many articles saying ProtonVPN doesn't log data. But so what? You still don't need a VPN for darn near anything.

Your data is in the clear for half of all internet access, which is literally the same as using no VPN at all. So, just what is any public or paid VPN really doing for you? That's right - nothing.

VPNs have only one truly useful purpose. And that's a direct tunnel between you and your employer's servers so there is no third party in between.

You now have 3 people along with many supporting articles that has answered the question for you. As I said, do as you wish, nobody here really cares what that is, but you are simply not getting the recommendation you are looking for.

The good news is that for others that have the same question, they can review the information provided to make their own decision.